Israel to pull troops from Lebanese border village

JERUSALEM – Nearly two months after the rest of its army left southern Lebanon, Israel agreed Sunday to pull its few dozen remaining soldiers from the Lebanese part of a village divided by the border, yielding control to U.N. peacekeepers.

The move came as Israel’s Cabinet discussed the three-day-old siege of Lebanese Prime Minister Fuad Saniora’s government by masses of pro-Hezbollah demonstrators in Beirut. Commentators here called the troop pullout a diplomatic gesture aimed at shoring up Saniora’s position, but some said it would be little help.

Israeli officials are alarmed by the crisis in Lebanon, fearing that a collapse of the moderate regime could bring to power an Iranian proxy state on Israel’s northern border and lead to another war like the inconclusive 34-day conflict last summer with Iranian ally Hezbollah.

The pullback of troops to the Israeli side of the border-straddling village of Ghajar was ordered by Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and other senior officials but not formally announced, apparently out of concern that an overt Israeli effort to influence events in Beirut might backfire.

The decision was leaked to reporters by an Israeli official, who described it as the result of weeks of talks between Israel and the United Nations and an interim step in ongoing negotiations over the village’s ultimate status. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Israeli troops would be gone within days.

Ghajar’s 2,500 residents, most from the Alawite sect, hold Israeli citizenship. The village passed from Syrian to Israeli control when Israel conquered the nearby Golan Heights in the Arab-Israeli war of 1967.